


Reparation

by kheradihr



Series: Expiation [1]
Category: Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Canon Divergence - Avengers (2012), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, some triggering material, warnings for self-harm
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-05-22
Updated: 2017-12-03
Packaged: 2017-12-12 14:23:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 20,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/812572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kheradihr/pseuds/kheradihr
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Loki's defeat in New York City, he is forced to return to Asgard with Thor. During the subsequent imprisonment, he is singled out by a legendary Valkyrie whose purpose on Asgard is unknown and feared. That Valkyrie holds both his damnation and salvation and it is up to Loki to decide his fate.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This piece has numerous mentions of self-harm and violence. While all are not graphic, they are in enough detail that they may disturb or trigger someone. Please be aware. Thanks.

It was not as Loki expected. He and Thor landed, the Tesseract between them, in Odin’s throne room. There were only three people there. Only three people to see his shame and failure. No honor guard. No courtiers. No advisors. No whispers and scandalous stares to remind him further of his imprisonment. No fanfare declaring Thor’s victory against the exiled pariah. His father – no, Odin sat on his throne in all of his state. His mother stood next to him, her hands clasped together tightly against her chest as if she’d been praying. Her hands always seemed to find each other when she worried. That caught his eye first; Frigga wasn’t a woman prone to worrying. She stepped forward the moment the energy surrounding them dissipated, hands opening to both of them. The third figure, one that melded into the window’s shadows, was unrecognizable.

“My boys. My precious boys have come home.” Frigga took the Tesseract from them and reached behind her where a woman Loki didn’t know took it. Frigga pulled both of them in her arms and hugged them. As Loki watched the woman, the Tesseract vanished in her grasp before she stepped back to the window that was half-hidden in sunset’s shadow. Then Frigga noticed Loki’s muzzle.

“Thor, what is this? Why is this on Loki?”

For once, Loki felt grateful for the muzzle. It let him smirk behind it as Thor shifted uncomfortably under his mother’s gaze. “It was a compromise. The near-Valkyrie wanted to cut Loki’s tongue out. Stark suggested other means to quiet him.”

Now his mother’s gaze was upon him. Being around the Other and the Chitauri was beneficial; he no longer fidgeted under his mother’s gaze. “We’ll get that off of you the moment we can. You’ve been missed, my dear.”

“Frigga.” Odin’s voice stopped her from saying more. All turned to the Allfather as he rose and stepped down from his throne. He placed a hand on Thor and Loki’s shoulders. Unlike his mother’s touch, Loki had no desire to feel Odin’s. “My sons, we will talk. But first, Loki, you will be moved to a secure room until we can guarantee your safety. Thor, take your brother down to his new room. Sigrdrifa, if you would accompany them.”

The woman reappeared from the shadows and sketched a short, clearly mocking bow in response to Odin’s request.

With Thor on one side and the woman on the other, they began the long walk through the palace. Thor talked the entire way, sometimes asking the woman a question. “See, brother, your room has been untouched. Mother wanted it left to you, down to the strange things you were growing in those jars. I may have snuck in and fed them so they should be alive when you return here. Sif and Volstagg destroyed another courtyard sparring. Mother was furious. She is making plans to lay a new mosaic. Last month, Fandral got caught in Heimdall’s niece’s chambers. His ribs still have not healed despite living in the healing room. Sigrdrifa, how fares you? Is Asgard to your liking?”

The woman nodded. When Thor didn’t continue his rambling she added, “Well, boy. It has been some time since I stayed in Asgard for a prolonged time. Your companions provide many diversions.”

“Good, good! I know you enjoy debate with Hogun; I think Loki will give you more of a challenge, considering your expertise.”

That coaxed something between a grunt and chuckle from her. “Perhaps.” She opened the door to the dungeons, offering it to them. “Come. We have some way to go.”

She took the lead, striding through the dungeons like a soldier, not a woman. Even Sif’s step held some womanly sway. Her robes were strange as well. She wore the short tunic and tight trousers tucked into high boots similar to Sif, but the cut was nothing he had ever seen. The tunic’s neckline was high but wide, draping down until it hit the small of her back with enough cloth that he wondered if it could be pulled up and over her head like a hood. The seams of her trousers did not meet, instead lacing kept them tight across her thighs. There were at least three knife sheaths in each boot, only one of six filled. The belt around her waist looked like it lacked something.

“Sigrdrifa is Valkyrie, brother,” Thor explained quietly to Loki, “and an old friend of our mother and father. I’m sure you will see much of her.”

Loki raised a brow at Thor, clearly asking _Should I care, brother?_ He increased his pace; he wanted to know what cell he’d be locked into. Traveling by Tesseract was exhausting without having to see his mother and father. He wanted to sleep off his humiliation and exhaustion in peace since the Midgardians had not let him. But they didn’t stop in the dungeons. Instead, they took an exceedingly circuitous route down to the Vault. Sigrdrifa strode past the Jotun Cask that flared at her in greeting and waited at a warrior’s rest next to the Destroyer’s grille for Thor and Loki to catch up to her. With a wave of Mjolnir the grille opened. Instead of the white null space the Destroyer inhabited there was a room. Thor led Loki through and began pointing out the accommodations.

“See, brother, we have bookshelves for you to place your books; Mother has been in the Library daily looking for things to interest you. The wardrobe is filled with your most comfortable clothes. Sif and Hogun helped me pick out a desk for you. We stocked it already. And here is your bed! It’s big enough that you should have no problem stretching out. Adjacent is a bath as well, brother.”

Gently, as if Thor worried touching Loki would harm him, he reached behind Loki and unclasped the muzzle. The hand with the muzzle in it fell away, but one stayed, gripping the back of his neck firmly. Thor leaned in and touched Loki’s forehead with his.

“It is good to have you back brother. I have to report to father, but I will be back.” Reluctantly he stepped back and the grille reformed, a barrier that only fell at Odin or Thor’s command. He was imprisoned. With many glances back, Thor left. Sigrdrifa gave him one scathing but unreadable look before stalking after Thor. Alone, he inspected his cell.

The bathroom was unimpressive by Asgardian standards, but for Loki who had been surrounded by Chitauri and Midgardians it was decadent. The bookshelves were empty and held no secret message or door behind it. The desk did in fact hold notebooks and pens that he once used during his studies. Inside one was a note in Sif’s handwriting, ‘ _Put these to good use, Loki._’ He smiled, she never signed anything she left him. His clothes were unexpected. These weren’t the robes he wore when he stood in Odin’s throne room while the Allfather held court. These were what he wore when he was elbow deep in a spell or some potion he was working on. His recluse clothes, as Fandral liked to call them. The stains that the household staff saw as mortal enemies still remained on the hems. Dreading facing the bed, he picked blindly for an outfit and went to bathe.

He shucked his clothes quickly, the metal accents clinking delicately against the tile floor. As the shower filled with steam – he didn’t want to soak in a bath just yet, he wanted to be clean – he took stock of himself. The bruises from the Hulk were fading, no longer purply-black like cold gas in space, they were the brilliant blue of Thor’s lightning. He was thin, too thin. In his haste to subjugate the Midgardians he forwent sustenance, relying on his accumulated mass and magic to keep him functioning. Skin stretched over bones that now jutted out in ways he hadn’t seen since the series of growth spurts put him out of clothes and his mother out of patience centuries ago. His hair needed scrubbing and trimming.

As he catalogued each scratch, healing cut, and the many other things that he ignored in his haste, his dissatisfaction with himself grew. Annoyed, he stepped into the shower and began scrubbing. Once he was scrubbed head to toe, he began again. Each time he selected a distinct area to exorcise his frustration from. Feet, arms, back, torso, the area behind his knees, the creases in his knuckles. Eventually there was nothing to left to scrub. He felt raw and angry still, the dull shine of the manacle cuffs on his wrists and ankles taunting him and reminding him of both his failure and salvation.

The manacles dampened his magic, weakening him enough to ensure he wouldn’t try to harm Thor – or himself – during the journey back to Asgard. Now he was safe enough to be home, even if he hardly believed he was deserving of such a thing. In the pounding spray he weakened a little, remembering his mother’s touch.

()()()()()()()()()

“Is it truly safe to leave the child in that room alone?” Sigrdrifa demanded with the first step into the throne room, now filled with Odin’s court. Guards at parade rest and bored stood taller as she walked by. The advisers and courtiers whispered to each other of the woman’s impertinence before being dismissed with a flick of Frigga’s hand. Sigrdrifa sneered at them as they left, frightened eyes looking for her weapons belt. It was blessedly absent.

“He’s fine,” Odin said as Frigga asked, “You think he’s in danger?”

“Of himself, always,” she answered Frigga. She stared down Thor until his growling stopped. “Odin, this is not the time for you to play cautious. He needs encouragement.”

“You just want me to leave Loki to you. He is still my son, Sigrdrifa Treeborn, and I will not lose him again.”

“You need to gain him before he can be lost again, Odin,” she replied in a language only he remembered.

He surged forward. “ _You will not touch or see my son, Valkyrie_!”

His display of temper didn’t faze her. She rolled a shoulder back, as if it wasn’t worth the energy to shrug. “I’ll defer for now, but if I see a chance, I will take it Odin. I serve one higher than you.” Without waiting for a reply she went to the window and dove from it. Mere seconds later, she rose into the air, great wings beating. She wheeled twice before veering towards Heimdall’s watch.

Thor turned to Odin. “Father…”

“I don’t want to hear it, Thor.”

He didn’t give ground, instead stepping forward to defend his people like he should. “She causes unrest in the court as well as the people, yet you give her free rein of Asgard.”

“She’s a Valkyrie, boy,” Odin snapped. “If you want to know why I allow her so much go do something Loki did too much of. Study.”

Thor spun and left, heading for the kitchens. He would study later; he needed to do something before he got some rest himself.

Loki was sitting on the desk’s chair when Thor entered his room with a case in his hand. Grinning wolfishly, Thor set out ten trays of food and pushed silverware into Loki’s hand.

“What is this, Thor?”

“Dinner! You always ate more than I so I know you must be famished. I tried to get all of your favorites but the cook caught me in the larder.”

Loki stared at him as Thor began digging into the nearest tray, not waiting for Loki to join in. He reached for the plate of golden apples and stared at it. The bags under his eyes looked sickening in the reflection cast back. He bit into it viciously and with it his appetite came in force. They ate around each other, avoiding any tray the other was devouring, a wary standoff with the potential to erupt. The suckling pig stuffed with vegetables was the only thing left.

Thor lifted his knife and fork towards the pig, clearly about to take a piece from it. Loki snarled and threw his knife at Thor. He deflected it right before it embedded itself in Thor’s eye and met Loki’s eyes. Never blinking, he cut the cheeks from the head and placed them on the long ignored plate. The positioning was barely in Loki’s direction. It was enough to shift his attention.

“Brother?” He asked slowly. “Would you also like the shoulder or the rump?”

Loki blinked out of the food-induced feral haze. “Shoulder. Some of the eggplant as well. Keep the steamed cabbage away from me.”

Thor chuckled and did exactly that, heaping extra herbed potatoes onto the side. He offered the plate to Loki who took it and sheepishly snatched Thor’s knife from his offering hand. Lips twisting to keep the smile bubbling up quashed, Thor rose to retrieve Loki’s knife and helped himself to a plate of food. When the pig was gone they both sat back and groaned.

“I have missed this food,” Thor sighed, patting his stomach. “Midgardian food is good, but it isn’t this,” he gestured to the carnage they wrought.

“Speak for yourself,” Loki half-heartedly scoffed. “I have tasted delicacies you could only dr—” His words fell away as he tried to swallow, couldn’t, and dashed to the bathroom. Thor was behind him as he heaved the contents of dinner into the toilet, blunt fingers finding his hair and pulling it back from his face. He couldn’t tell if the moisture on his face was backsplash or tears from the force of his expulsions. “Why are you doing this,” he gasped between heaves.

“Your hair has grown too long,” Thor murmured as one hand freed itself to reach for a cloth. Loki could hear water running for a moment before a cold washcloth was folded across the back of his neck. He sat back on his heels.

“No. All of this. Giving me respite despite my crimes.”

Thor’s eyes were soft, yet solemn as he offered Loki a glass of water. “You are my brother.” He said it as if there was no other reason. “I will find you food that you can eat.”

Ignoring Loki’s protests that he could walk on his own, Thor helped him to bed and stayed as Loki crawled in. He fell asleep almost instantly. Gathering the trays, Thor left him in peace.

Sif was waiting for him outside his room. He sighed when she followed him in. This conversation was long in coming; at least she waited until he brought Loki home before bringing this up.

“How are you?”

“Tired, Sif. He refused to come home.” Thor began stripping off his clothes. Sif sat on his bed, desensitized to the buttocks in her face. During their youth, Thor fancied himself a nudist. It titillated many of the ladies in court and for a time she worried her eyes would stick to the back of her head.

“But you brought him back. You did it, Thor.”

“People died, Sif. People who were friends of my friends. The man who interrogated me for his planet’s safety died challenging Loki. Alone! Innocent people, who I swore to protect, died in the streets and I could not save them, Sif. And what for? Because my father could not set aside his pride and be honest with us!”

“Thor…” _You blame this on your father but you blame yourself just as much_ , she thought. That was the trouble with her position as one of Thor’s companions. Growing up alongside Thor and Loki meant that she knew the family dynamic better than anyone. Which was why she didn’t have blind loyalty to Thor like the Warriors Three. In all these centuries she still hadn’t decided if that was a good thing or not.

“Are you going to see him? I’m sure he’s already found the note you left him.”

Her answer got caught in her throat. She swallowed and it hurt. “I…Not right now. He tried to kill me Thor. I can understand him going after _you_ ,” he chuckled at that, “but he knew I would be there and he still gave the order. I have to settle things with myself before I see him.”

Thor nodded. Loki and Sif’s friendship was different and Thor didn’t try to understand it. He knew Sif would come around, it was just a matter of when and why. “Are we sparring tomorrow?”

“Be sure to sleep well. I don’t want to mop you off the floor afterwards.”

Thor’s answering scoff was half-hearted.

()()()()()()()()()

Loki slept long and deep. Each time he woke, ravenous and feeling disgusting. Thor was there the moment he finished scrubbing himself red with food. His stomach couldn’t handle most food; his diet was a thin but nutritious broth, watered down wine and milk and if he hadn’t thrown that up, half of Thor’s buttered slice of bread. At first he could only choke down a few swallows of milk but with time he regained his proper appetite. With that came the restlessness. He had a Jotun’s lean physique and with it seemingly boundless energy. After his first meal of solid food he decided he was ready to being training again.

He didn’t expect his mother coming to bring him food off schedule.

“Loki Odinson! What do you think you are doing?”

“Push ups, Mother.” Neither of them deigned to mention he was on the ceiling doing them.

“Well stop. I do not need to find you collapsed on the floor like last time. Sit up, I have things for you.” She set a stack of books and his lunch – chicken noodle soup, a recipe of Midgard – on his lap when he knelt on the floor. “It is the entire series. If you wish to exercise, exercise your mind. Your body is too weak still.”

“Yes, Mother.” He could not begrudge her; it had been so long since he needed mothering. At a very young age he decided not to bother Mother since she had to watch Thor and grow up. It worked. But now after everything he put her through he couldn’t say no to her.

She smiled, patting his cheek. “That’s my boy. Come sit with me and I’ll tell you about my new project.”

She helped him set aside the books and bowl in hand he sat next to her. She eyed him expectantly. He took a forkful of noodles and shoved them into his mouth. After a few of these mouthfuls she began telling him about relaying the new courtyard. Thor’s friends would be responsible for both the heavy lifting and delicate work. Frigga believed in making one accountable, always had. Loki remembered each time his mother had a punishment for them even when Odin brushed their misbehavior off as youthful exuberance. Where Odin was steel, Frigga was discipline. He knew Thor and his friends would have been banished long ago if Frigga hadn’t disciplined them.

“Have you thought of a design?”

Frigga’s brow furrowed in thought. “I have but there are some difficulties with the design. I know they use that courtyard to mediate disputes between each other. I would like a way to integrate some protection into the courtyard for anyone engaged around it. Have you seen something like that in your studies?”

“Perhaps.” _Yes_. A long time ago, in another lifetime, he discovered Sif’s secret training courtyard. After an incident he spent weeks sneaking out there at night carving protective sigils into the bottom of the flagstones. If she noticed that she got hurt less perfecting her art, she never said anything.

“If I get you the right books, could you find something that could work? I don’t want you to hurt yourself trying the spells, Loki.”

“Of course, Mother. I would be happy to do it. It will give me something to think on.”

“Good boy,” she rose and kissed his forehead. Stroking his cheek one more time – it was obvious she didn’t want to leave him – she left much like Thor did, always looking back. He wondered if they were afraid he would disappear in between moments.

It was touching yet laughable in a morbid way. He couldn’t go anywhere with the manacles on him. Besides, the Chitauri would now have a price on his head for his failure.

The thought brought him back to what his mother said. She didn’t want him to hurt himself trying the spells. Why would she worry about that? He could barely feel his magic with the manacles on, let alone use it.

Without thinking, he tried a basic light spell in the palm of his hand.

As the light appeared the manacle of the offending hand tightened, digging into his skin. He pressed the spell, making the light float in the air above him. More pain around his wrist; he could feel his fingers growing cold at the lack of circulation. Making the light fly about the room has his flesh splitting under the manacle’s tightening, blood beading around the metal. He exhaled and the light vanished, pain with it. Staring at his wrist, his head felt clearer, pain scrubbing his mind clean of some of the filth that filled it. He examined the damage in the bathroom. It wasn’t permanent; he would heal in a few hours. He rinsed off the blood and looked at himself. He didn’t look as taut or strained. Looking into his own eyes didn’t trigger the urge to smash the mirror. These things kept circling inside his mind as he reached for the novels his mother brought him.

()()()()()()()()()

He didn’t try another spell for over a week. He reread the series three times in that time waiting for Frigga to bring him the reference books he needed to help her. Every meal came and went with Thor there until Loki couldn’t handle his brother’s twitchy prattling about everything except his mother and father.

“Where is Mother, Thor?”

“Busy, you know how she is.”

 _You are lying, brother. Mother was never too busy for us_. “She was supposed to bring me books to help her with the mosaic.” Thor paled, realizing that Loki noticed his discomfort. “Thor.”

“Sif took Mother to Ran and Aegir’s home by the sea. Father will not talk about it.”

“Surely someone knows why,” Loki insisted. “Gossip is rampant in the palace.”

“I am not you, Loki, able to hear every secret about the palace.”

“Thor, you can find out. You just need to ask the right person.”

Thor smiled tiredly and clapped his brother’s shoulder. “Okay, Loki. I will look into it.”

When the doors to the Vault shut, Loki went to the shower. Setting the cold water to full blast, he stripped and stepped inside. He always had an immunity to the cold but that wasn’t why he was in there. He called heat out of his body, a warmth spell heating his flesh and triggering the manacles. They cut into him deeply, reacting to the energy he was summoning.

He didn’t stop pushing power until the shower stall was draining dark red. When the water ran clear again he reached up and turned off the shower. Cold, exhausted and drained he stumbled to his bed and fell into it.

()()()()()()()()()

Dawn was an hour from breaking when Thor found himself on the training grounds. He wasn’t alone, another person beat him there and was practicing forms with a glaive. It wasn’t often he saw her in the ring; she usually avoided entering at all.

“I thought Valkyries were masters of every weapon,” he said. “Are you here to practice because you lack ability?” He was surly from lack of sleep and she was an available – and skilled – target.

Her wings, reminding him of a falcon’s, snapped open before disappearing into her back. When she faced him her lips were pulled back in a feral snarl. “I am proficient in more weapons than the years of your life, boy. I am here for reasons beyond petty _practice_.”

“And what reasons are those?” he asked, whipping a spear around hard enough to slice the air.

“The blood coursing in your veins. I can’t kill your father, but I can still pretend my blade is entering his body when I make a thrust.”

He growled reflexively. Her anger was based in something there were whispers of in the court. Odin and Frigga had argued, Sif taking Frigga away before the fight brought the palace to its foundations. He knew why now.

Loki. It all came back to Loki. Always Loki.

Thor was tired of it. Tired of his mother being blocked by his father. Tired of his father’s small-mindedness. Tired of everything painful or wearying being somehow tied to Loki. He wondered if this was how Loki felt.

“Come spar against me, child. Free the thoughts that trouble you so you can think clearly.” Sigrdrifa said, saluting him with her glaive before going to the ready.

“Any rules?”

Sigrdrifa smirked. “None that you have to follow.”

Their first clash sent shockwaves throughout the grounds.

()()()()()()()()()

“Thor!” Frigga rushed into the healing room, cloak still pinned to her dress and smelling like the sea and horses. She hurried to Thor’s side, taking his hands. Sif, following, looked over at Sigrdrifa who was sitting in a chair near Thor’s bed. The only mark on her was a bruise on her cheekbone that was already fading.

“I’m fine Mother.”

“You look like a Nidhogg used you as a chew toy before leaving you to come out the opposite end.” There was a snort from Sigrdrifa and a rude gesture from Thor at Sif.

“Thank you Sif,” Frigga said unsmiling before looking at Sigrdrifa. “How do you feel beating a child a small fraction of your age?”

“Good.” She shrugged.  “He demanded me to continue, Frigga. I honored his request. You should be proud, he lasted longer than Odin at that age.”

Frigga _tched_ and stroked her son’s hair. “If she tries to goad you into anything you dislike, tell her no.”

“Mother, you’re treating me like a child,” Thor protested.

“That’s because you are—” Frigga’s words died as Odin swept into the healing room, thunder in his face.

“Frigga.”

“Odin.”

Sigrdrifa rose quickly, face catching in a grimace at sore muscles. At one point Thor made it through her defenses and Mjolnir packed a punch. Valkyrie or no, taking Mjolnir to the face was not born lightly. “I have duties to attend to,” she declared hastily.

“Stay.” Frigga and Odin’s command echoed off the domed room.

“I think not.” Sigrdrifa teleported out. Sif took the opportunity to slip away as well. Thor looked over to where Fandral was ensconced. He was asleep, or at least putting up a good enough impression to avoid the building storm.

“Frigga, I wish to speak to you.”

“I do not. If you will excuse me, Husband, I have books to bring to my son.” With one last pat to Thor’s cheek she left. Odin wordlessly followed shortly after.

()()()()()()()()()

No one knew what Frigga and Odin discussed but she now regularly visited Loki, sometimes spending hours poring over Loki’s sigils and her design to ensure everything fit together. The court noticed Frigga’s absence from the throne room but did not gossip; Odin’s temper had them on their toes too often.

It was one such time that Thor climbed the steps to the throne room. It was strangely devoid of courtiers chatting in the alcoves that dotted the winding staircase and there were no guards at their post. Thor took the steps three and four at a time.

His father’s voice always carried, even when he whispered. Now, it was a roar in a one-sided argument. Thor crouched by the door, listening to catch the second party in whatever set his father off.

“You go too far, Valkyrie.”

Thor could almost hear Sigrdrifa shrug. “It matters not how far I progress in this, Allfather. It is up to you. _Your son or your Realm._ ”

Her voice set the Realm quaking in fear. Thor felt it in his bones and wondered how she could shake Asgard so deeply. He reached for Mjolnir, its heavy strength a comforting balm. It was up in a guard as Odin exploded.

“I will not give you the satisfaction of choosing.”

“Then you leave it to me.”

“ _Leave Loki alone!_ ”

Odin’s shout propelled Thor forward, standing his ground as Sigrdrifa approached. She was tall, almost meeting his eyes but she felt taller. Mjolnir swung up to chest level.

“No further, Treeborn. I do not wish to fight you.”

She moved Mjolnir aside gently and stepped into his distance. “Do not get involved. Children should not meddle in adult affairs,” she whispered before passing by him.

Incensed, he swung in an arc, aiming for her open back. What was smooth open skin now was layered armor that caught the blow without a sound or forward inertia. He flew backwards, led by Mjolnir and hanging by a dislocated shoulder as he plowed through the palace walls. He switched hands and spun the hammer, slowing him enough to shift to hovering. Eyes scanned the windows for sign of her.

Panic crawled in his gut. Sigrdrifa was nowhere to be seen.

“Father, where would she go?”

It was his mother that answered, on her way up to the throne room. Frigga laughed and Thor realized where Sigdrifa was going.

He caught her outside the Vault, wings curling around her body to shield her from the lightning bolt he threw at her. When she didn’t move he crept towards her, wary. She still didn’t move.

“Why are you doing this?” he demanded.

A black brow rose between parted wings. “Child, do you even know what I am doing?”

“I do not need to know more than your threats shake Asgard to her core.”

She barked a laugh. “Of course she is shaken. She fears for herself.”

“Because of your threats.”

“Because of her son’s arrogance. You two are a matched pair, stubborn and stupid.”

With a roar, Thor charged, swinging Mjolnir with all the anger that exploded with her insult. He was fed up with her insults and side-speak. Sigrdrifa caught his blow and let it slam them through the doors of the Vault. Loki, head deep in another rune book startled, fingers frozen mid-trace as his eyes shifted instinctually towards the threat. Her eyes shifted towards the movement and Thor pushed his advantage, bearing her down to the floor with his and Mjolnir’s combined weight. Then feet were in his stomach as she rolled backwards and kicked him up and off. She was already on her feet when Thor stood, arms raised in front of the grille. The artifacts in the Vault were all aware, the Eye flicking between her and Thor as others pulsed. Loki’s eyes shifted from all parties outside his cell and warily wondered if the grille would keep him safe from the impending bloodbath. He was enjoying the tentative truce between him and the launderers.

Sigrdrifa stepped forward.

Thor shifted his stance wider to brace for an attack.

She shifted to the side into an empty alcove and sank down, legs folded underneath her. As she settled, her armor sloughed off and vanished. Her eyes closed and she ignored Thor still standing there ready for another assault. Loki swallowed a chuckle.

“What is this?” Thor demanded. “You choose to fight through me to obtain access and then you sit and shut your eyes?”

“I am meditating, boy. Perhaps you should learn to. It would give your mind the chance to free itself from your tight skull.”

Thor bristled. “You threatened Asgard. You threatened Loki.”

“I did not. You do not listen; an Odinsblood trait, I’m sure.” She sighed. “Go ask your father what I requested. I assure you it was not as malicious as both of you thought. And boy,” she added, never looking at Loki, “go back to your studies. Your gilded cage will not be dented today.”


	2. Chapter 2

The Valkyrie unnerved Loki. After the fight that ended abruptly – to Thor’s benefit since Loki was sure Thor would not be walking for some time if the fight continued – she meditated for hours. He did not remember when she left; one of the times he checked over his shoulder she was there, as still as on of the relics in the Vault, the next she was gone. When he questioned the guards at the entrance even they could not tell him when she left. It was the beginning of a pattern. Every few days since the fight she came to the Vault and meditated, three or four hours at a time in complete stillness as if she were just another relic in the Vault. It wasn’t her stillness that discomfited him, though. It was her aura of sheer otherness beyond anything he had encountered. She did not belong in Asgard, of that he was certain. She was still the first Valkyrie he had seen; if one visited Asgard their presence was a whisper of rumor, not something as visible or volatile as this. Seeing her this close he wondered if all Valkyries had vortices of danger and rage swirling around them, a catastrophic storm with the potential to break at the slightest provocation.

She made Loki uncomfortable enough that he regularly checked over his shoulder to make sure that she was on the other side of the grille. What pride he had from being able to unflinchingly stand before the Other took a dent with her. But he was sure she alone could decimate the Chitauri fleets without much effort and that was a minor balm to his pride. Perhaps her face would show something other than utter boredom or disdain in an activity like that.

One thing he was grateful for was that she was quiet, even if it was an unnatural silence. He was progressing far in his rune studies and was at the point where he was building the sigils at the size and complexity that would go on the underside of his mother’s mosaic. The smaller versions of the sigils worked without much trouble and building them did not trigger his manacles since it was a focus of will alone to build them. When the sigils were carved into the mosaic stones they would not only need will but power and blood. That coupled with the fact that laying the stones would create a second identical sigil in the mortar would amplify the sigil’s strength exponentially. He had learned since he augmented Sif’s favorite courtyard. With the Valkyrie’s silence, unlike Thor’s loud and perpetually inquisitive presence, he could work quickly and precisely for many hours, goaded on by the pleasure of working on projects like this. He enjoyed puzzles that took months and years to solve; the pleasure of using newly gained knowledge filled him with satisfaction. Subjugating a Realm meant there was little time for more frivolous hobbies. Perhaps if he saw the sky again he would take up falconry. Keeping the Hawkeye piqued a curiosity in him.

Taking the stack of detailed sigils, Loki began laying them out on the floor to examine them spread out over a large surface. He wanted to make sure there were no discrepancies or duplications in the pattern. Both resulted in wasted energy, which should spread throughout the sigils without having to repeat designs unnecessarily. If a sigil was to be duplicated, it was by increasing the depth of the initial shape whether by drawing thicker lines or carving deeper into the medium. Wasted energy also meant the sigil would be weaker and lose efficacy faster. Considering the brutes that would use this particular courtyard, it needed to be strong enough to withstand the devastation of an inexhaustible army. Just as he laid out the last sheet of super thin paper movement caught his eye. The Valkyrie – Sigrdrifa, he remembered – strode out the door with silent footfalls. Instead of continuing up the next flight of stairs and up to the palace she stopped to face the edge. Black wings snapped out of her back, stretching out so far to enter the Vault with one as the other curled around her to reach in the direction of her forward gaze before tucking behind her. Seeing it for himself, he realized why all of her tunics were backless. Form for function, like his older armor. Though he wondered how many weapons she could secret on her body. With the tightness of her clothing, he didn’t think many. His old armor had so many he had occasionally surprised himself with an unexpected prick or had a tassel tugged to reveal a garrote. It was only amusing to one person and him in their fumbling haste to have a moment together, but it was enough. He missed her laugh for an instant.

She held still for long enough for Loki to set his feet underneath him in preparation for anything. Then, with a flap of her wings she dove from the walkway into the abyss under the Vault. The gust of wind from her wings scattered Loki’s papers into a blizzard of nonsensical designs. With a curse he began gathering them, trying to organize them in the exact order that they were arranged. Eventually, with much muttering and a headache, Loki managed to find each sheet of paper and arranged them in the proper order. When he lay them again, this time in an inward counterclockwise spiral, the sigils fell in a way that felt better than the first. He hadn’t even noticed they felt wrong during the first laying. He huffed a laugh full of self-condescension. He was getting rusty; even in laying powerless penciled sigils, they fell better when done in ritual. That was the first lesson his mother taught him about sigils. The last sheaf rested in the center of the spiral as Loki looked on from the outside, bare toes just resting on the nearest sheet. He could feel the potential and hunger in the sigil. It would work. He just had to be just as exacting when enlarging the sigil. Ensuring the equivalent spaces between the lines during the calculations were just as important as the lines themselves. Each space was a potential well for power to rest when not in use.  Each space had the potential for another part of the sigil to blossom as the empty space widened. The emptiness was the unknown and Loki wanted to dive into the spaces and see what was there. For the first time since his imprisonment months ago he looked forward to something.

As he reached for the larger sheets a scream rent the air. The papers reacted, swirling up and around Loki until they herded him onto the center sheet. In wonder he watched them swirl sigil side out counterclockwise, clearly protecting despite being without the elements that made the sigils powerful. It was when the sigils began peeling off and drifting through the grille that Loki realized the screaming was still going on. It reverberated in the Vault, each artifact’s presence turning inward and away from the noise. Cowering. He wanted to do the same but was rooted to the floor and still boxed in by the sigils. It was a sound of anguish and pain, a soul deep wound that would kill the screamer long before it healed. Looking down, he realized he had his shirt over his chest clutched tight. He forced his fingers to let go, to smooth out the worn cloth while lying in his heart that he did not recognize something in that noise, that his own soul wound slowed its bleeding in response. He watched as weeks worth of work peeled apart, half wrapping around his wrists and ankles while the other half flew out of his cell and dove off the walkway.

To the Valkyrie.

He sighed and began plucking the empty sheets from where they floated. She was lucky he had an eidetic memory.

()()()()()()()()()

Loki rebuilt the sigil. Sigrdrifa continued to meditate in the Vault roughly once a week. Occasionally after meditating she would dive down into the darkness for an unknown amount of time. Even rarer was the too familiar scream. Whenever she dove, he stopped working and locked the current sigil into a runed case – whose runes twinned many of the ones etched into his manacles – he got from Frigga to prevent them from reacting. The older and smaller versions he left out to watch the sigil split and circle around himself and, what he assumed, her. Now another puzzle formed in his mind, this time about what the sigil was reacting to in her. What would threaten a Valkyrie to the extent that powerless sigils were compelled to respond? Since answers to that puzzle did not come easily, he let it lie. There was no point in struggling with a problem when there were so many others on hand.

The regular triggering of his manacles with magic kept his mind clear of the self-hate that perpetually threatened to slow his work and trigger the larger sigils. Timing his sessions was difficult at times because he had to do it without interference or alerting his family to his actions. His mother visited whenever she could to check on him under the guise of asking about the progression of the sigil. Her presence was always welcome, if sometimes inopportune. Frigga always had a kind touch or word for him in praise. It was familiar and bitter at the same time. She was the only one who praised him for his ingenuity and wile. Thor often came in between meals without announcing himself. He usually would ask some random question to which Loki snapped off a reply that only made Thor’s brows furrow further before he wandered off again. Only the Valkyrie seemed to keep to a schedule. Ironic since she seemed to have the most free time. He could always expect her at a certain time; she was ritualistic about her meditations, even if he believed there were probably better places to meditate. Like the zenith of the palace. That had been his favorite place when he was still in training. It gave him the solitude and perspective he had needed when learning the deep magics as well as a place to keep secrets hidden. He wondered if the birds that used to nest there remained.

To keep his deeds secret, Loki waited until it was late enough no one would disturb him – the only person who would see him this late was still not speaking to him. In the darkness of night he stripped and bled himself as the pounding shower spray washed everything, his shame, frustration, self-loathing, blood and tears – evidence of weakness – away. It didn’t happen often but like Sigrdrifa’s clockwork visits he always found himself falling into bed naked and wrung out, wounds healing almost as soon as he was asleep. If Thor noticed anything during the obnoxious times where he would wake him up with loud cheer and breakfast right after dawn he did not say anything. But he was progressing. The wounds from the Hulk were gone and he had the same density and muscle tone as when he still believed he was Asgardian. That realization was bitter but he swallowed it. He had been naïve, but strong. He needed the strength now to sketch the larger sigils on pages as large as Volstagg’s stomach. The slightest tremor in the line would reflect in the sigil. Irregular lines were signs of weakness. As he drew he could feel the wards inside the sigil seeking power, seeking him before recoiling at the barrier the manacles made around him. A part of him beat against the barrier, screaming to meet and fuel the sigil. But no matter how hard he threw himself against that invisible wall he would rise bloody and bruised without a single iota of ground gained. He could feel himself sliding deeper into something too dark. Gritting his teeth against inevitability, he continued to work.

()()()()()()()()()

The bed was propped up on its side, leaning against the wall and with the desk on the same wall as the wardrobe Loki’s floor was almost clear. He needed the space to lay this version of the sigil and ensure his calculations still held accurate. This was the final draft he would make before his sigil would be carved into the mosaic tiles Frigga had waiting for him. If there were any errors it could ruin the entire sigil and he would have to start from scratch. The months he put into the sigil would have been wasted. He couldn’t afford another failure.

Carefully he laid out each sheet of paper in the counterclockwise spiral drawing inward in the pattern he knew the sigil desired. There was no sound except for the whispering of paper; he kept his breath even and shallow enough that it was drowned by the sound of paper moving. Finally he stood on the outside, toes touching the paper as he waited for the telltale summons in his blood telling him that the sigils had been laid properly and seeking power to feed them.

Silence answered him.

Failure battered him harder than the Hulk but he stood against it. He couldn’t fall and wrinkle the pages, even if the sigils on it were dead. They were his. His work. His blood and sweat and yearning. Choking on the tidal wave of hatred against himself, Loki stumbled to the bathroom, fallen clothes adding new patterns to the mosaic. His shoulder ached from throwing himself into the shower stall and he shook as he tried to turn on the faucet. A harsh curse and he threw both temperatures to full blast and let the water pummel him until he was a heap on the shower floor. Pure magic without spell or focus triggered the manacles with vicious force and he laughed as he watched his skin turn red. Red. That color that now had more meanings now. He was covered in it, belonged doused in his own red rather than the blue of his Jotun form or the icy pale of his preferred skin. He didn’t even deserve to be bathed in others’ red. He couldn’t even do a simple sigil correctly, how could he ever deserve to sta—

Glass broke as a hand punched through the shower stall to grab him around the neck and drag him out of the shower. The hand pulled him dripping over the sigil but it did not move or smear from his wet body. The oddity had him distracted long enough for the hand to throw him through what was left of the grille to his cell. He tumbled and skidded on the floor, wet naked skin letting him slide far. As he pushed himself upright he saw Sigrdrifa coming for him. She scruffed him like a misbehaving kitten and took flight. Struggling got him dragged through the sky by his hair, blood raining on whomever they flew over. He sensed it before he actually saw the shattered remains of the Bifrost. Then he felt it as his spine impacted the shattered edge.

“How dare you,” Sigrdrifa roared. “How dare you take the coward’s way when you have much to answer for.” She slammed him into the edge of the Bifrost. “I am bound here, tethering your pompous overinflated self-involved civilization to my Mother because you had to throw a temper tantrum!

“Do you know what it is like Loki Laufeyson to be separated from a family that knows you so well some would assume you were all one flesh?” she demanded then scoffed with the same breath. “Of course you have no idea. Instead of finding the swathe of common ground you and your family share you choose the crumbling isle of your genetics to stand on. People suffer because of you! Not just me – who cares what _I_ go through, it will be a flash of starlight in my lifetime – but _others_ , Loki. What about the mortals who lost family because of your petty fits? How many Valkyries sing dirges for the loved ones too in shock to even exist let alone mourn?

“That is your duty,” he bit back, splinters of Bifrost digging into his skin. He could feel the energy of it buzzing in the crystal shards as they pierced his skin.

She slapped him. Not hard, but the strike was sudden enough to rock his face to the side. “Our duty is not to clean up after misbehaving children!”

He looked at her, hair blending in with the night – had it become that late already? – as her eyes burned like twin red supergiants. Stories of Jotuns with their red eyes, looming out of the shadows to eat unsuspecting disobedient children ran through his mind. It was ironic he called himself that once, irony and arrogance. The stories should speak of beautiful women who turned into monsters when they caught disobedient children. She was fury and punishment embodied and she came for him, the sinful child. He wondered if the stories included adults as well. Then, as sudden as a lightning strike, she jumped backwards using his body as her springboard. Thor dropped from the sky in between Sigrdrifa and Loki, Mjolnir at the ready. The Valkyrie held no weapons; not that she needed them. After experiencing her power firsthand he knew this: she was a walking weapon.

One turned against his brother.

“Stand down, Thor.”

Thor couldn’t help but grin. It was even in his voice. “Those are my words to you, Valkyrie. You have no cause to attack Loki.”

“This is not an attack. This is an intervention with a touch of anger management.”

“The anger must be yours, then,” Loki’s voice drifted up from where he lay. “I feel nothing but pain.”

She barked a laugh. “Stay there, boy. I’m not done with you yet. Thor, stand down.”

“Not while you aim to harm him.”

“I’m doing the same as you, Thor. I’m trying to help him.” For a moment she sounded imploring.

“Harming him is not helping him!”

What kindness had been in her voice fled, leaving nothing but a sharp blade of cutting words. “How is not letting him be accountable for his transgressions helping him Thor? I know you seek to repair the damage he has wrought but locking him into a gilded cage and protecting him through obfuscation is not how to do it!”

Loki struggled to get his elbows underneath him so he could see their encounter. Moving made the shards in his skin wriggle deeper, called by the magic still tingling in his blood. He was vaguely reminded of the standoffs between Thor and Odin except this was at a scale that could shatter Asgard. “What is she talking about, Thor?”

“Quiet, Loki. You’re injured.”

“What is it about you Odinsblood that refuses to confess your heart’s wishes?” she muttered but the wind still carried her words to Loki’s ears. One moment she was in front of Thor empty handed and then she vanished. She teleported behind Thor, alighting on the shattered edge delicately, wings gone. A blade appeared in her hand and she pointed it at Loki’s throat. He followed its length to see her bristling with weapons. That was why her belt always looked empty and her clothes tight. “Tell me why you defend him. Be honest, Odinson. If you are not I will kill Loki and leave, wyrd be damned.”

Loki felt Asgard tremble. The blade at his throat bobbled like a seismograph tracing the movement, somehow not slicing open skin even though he knew – _felt_ – the blade was only scant atoms thick.

Thor didn’t hesitate in answering. Did not even take the time to turn to face her, only his head tipped back. “He is my brother no matter his deeds and I love him despite them. If you cherish your sisters as much as you claim to you will not harm him in your pain, tree daughter. He…he does enough of that to himself.”

For a long time there was nothing but the sound of the falls below and wind roaring above them. Loki stared at Thor, an uncomprehending look in his eyes. Thor cared. Thor _knew_. He knew all this time and did not say anything, show any indication that he was aware of Loki’s actions. Thor, shoulders low, eventually turned and smiled wanly at him, silently apologizing before returning eye contact with Sigrdrifa as though that was what stayed her blade. Then she opened her hand and the blade was gone, a bittersweet twist in her mouth.

“You learned from Loki well, child, to play my own kin against me.” She looked so tired as she nodded to Loki. “Take him to the healing room. He needs it.”

The moment she vanished Thor dropped Mjolnir and reached for Loki. “Did she harm you?”


	3. Chapter 3

Loki began to laugh. Was he hurt? Of course he was hurt. He hurt himself and then the Valkyrie hurt him further with more efficiency and brutality than he’d ever experienced. She should never meet the Avengers, though he was sure that that one was her kin. His brother was an idiot, even if he was well meaning. He couldn’t stand idiots. Each time he tried to answer, whether in words or a nod, he laughed harder. When he didn’t stop laughing Thor reached for him and tried to pick him up gently, clearly trying to avoid the swathe of his back full of Bifrost shards. The shards sang in reaction to Thor’s proximity, a too loud chorus vibrating his body. While they reacted to Loki because of his magic, they knew Thor for what he was, their master, and began vibrating. Loki’s hysterical laughter pitched higher with the hiccups of pained screams.

Unable to carry Loki comfortably, Thor laboriously shifted Loki around until he rested against his back, bare thighs wrapped around Thor’s waist. The metal accents on Thor’s armor were cold against his naked skin. The slight distraction was obliterated by the Bifrost shards suddenly digging further into his flesh. He felt the first piece pierce his lungs just as Thor began walking. With each step the shards wriggled further into his skin, trying to get closer to Thor. Loki’s breath shortened, each puncture hastening the deflation of his lungs. Gritting against the pain he set a low level shield along the approaching wave of crystalline energy. His manacles tightened but not enough to make him bleed. Pale and sweating, his head dropped onto Thor’s shoulder and he let the white noise of pain envelop him. His mind rolled the sigils and design over and over in his mind lazily analyzing it for issues, never resting even though his body demanded it.

“The courtyard,” Loki started against Thor’s back. The haze he had fallen into was gone and now the pain was back. The pain and the puzzle he still couldn’t solve.

“Which one, brother? We have many.”

“The one Sif and Volstagg destroyed. The one I’ve been working on for months now.” He was proud he could still sound scathing with his lungs punctured. By the unknown reaches, he _hurt_.

Thor frowned. “You’re injured. We need to get you to the healing room.”

“Let him, Thor. He is single-minded in his task. It’s something admirable, if oft foolish.” Sigrdrifa’s voice came from the shadows. She followed shortly after with Sif behind her. Sif took one look at Loki and without blanching found a place to wrap her arm around his back, low enough to be considered his buttocks. He leaned into her; her presence, while icy in her distance, was soothing. The Bifrost didn’t sing or move in her presence; her power was pure strength without a trace of magic. She caught him as he struggled free from Thor and stumbled.

“It’s this way.” Her eyes shifted in the opposite direction of the healing room, lips and brow set in the way that meant she doubted if Loki could make it down the corridor, let alone to the courtyard. Loki nodded and reminded himself to breathe.

“Go. I need to see it.”

Using the secret strength hidden in her lithe form, Sif took all of Loki’s weight and began to walk. He could feel the Bifrost shards in him yearning for Thor and then Sigrdrifa as they fell in step behind Loki. Thor was clearly torn between his wariness of Sigrdrifa and the need to protect Loki because his distance constantly shifted between the two. It was after he came too close a second time and triggered a whistling scream from Loki that Sigrdrifa caught his arm.

“Thor, stop. I can hear his body screaming each time you near him. The Bifrost sings for you and hurts him.”

Loki heard Thor’s steps falter, then slow. The shards in his back and lungs quieted to simple humming. Now he could at least help Sif drag him down the halls to the courtyard. When she felt his weight shift she looked at him for a moment, eyes unreadable but that muscle in the corner of her mouth twitched. He smiled ruefully at her, a gesture from their childhood that she did not return. Sif continued into the entry arch and stopped there.

It was one of the larger courtyards, though not the exact one his mind had been referencing when laying the sigil-filled sheets. This one was larger and oblong rather than the giant square they used as a training field with a shrub line framing the perimeter of the courtyard. He could use that. He raised his hand, base sigils in his mind, and traced laying the sigils in the counterclockwise spiral it wanted with the adjustments for the shape of the courtyard. The sigils, simple lines in his mind, shone bright enough to blind him. When he blinked away the spots in his eyes he knew how to adjust the sigils spatially for them to work. With the expanded area he could also integrate the shrubs into the sigil for use. If he had enough time to do the research he could have his mother plant protective plants in to heighten the sigils’ efficacy further. Satisfied, he let his head drop onto Sif’s shoulder. She smelled of leather, steel oil, and the kindness shared between outsiders. He remembered her cold eyes and how she learned to hide her thoughts from him. That hurt more than the now still Bifrost shards in him.

“I’m done. Take me to the healing room.”

Sif nodded. Hiking him higher up on her hips as gently as she could without pulling on his back, she turned and headed for the healing room. As her bound up hair brushed against his cheek, Loki shut his eyes.

()()()()()()()()()

“Loki!” He could feel his mother’s concern and Odin’s simmering anger reverberate against the healing room’s walls as they entered. It ratcheted the pain even higher and he wanted to scream but his jaw was locked shut. He needed the shards out. Whatever the sigils he thought of earlier that protected him lost power the further they got from the courtyard where they would be planted. That was fine for a time; his body was still producing a very low-level repulsion force keeping the shards in place so they didn’t move. The expenditure drained the shreds of energy Loki had and Sif had to shift him until he was on her back, fingers bruising his thighs to keep him from sliding off her back. When they turned down the last corridor towards the healing room the shards began moving again, this time towards the magic of the healing room. Sigrdrifa had come alongside Sif, presence masked completely to remove another magical force for the shards to react to, and told her to walk faster or the pull of the healing room could rip the shards through Loki and Sif. He wanted to laugh when Sigrdrifa spoke that but all that came out when he tipped his head back was a scream of pain. Sif ran. It was excruciating but it got him to stop screaming or he would bite his tongue through.

“Frigga, please step back. We need to get him laying down now.” Frigga nodded, the only person known to not fight Sigrdrifa when she gave an order. Odin stood a few steps back, an ominous cloud of anger swirling around him.

Sif shifted Loki as gently as she could but the pain never stopped. He tried to remember to breathe as he rested on one of the beds, face buried into the pillow to hide how hard it was to breathe. He could feel Sif’s hesitation in moving away. She was angry with him still but she still somehow cared. Lifting an arm slowly, he pushed at her thigh with fingertips numb from pain. Before she could step away with no further bruised feelings between them Sigrdrifa spoke out of nowhere.

“Stay Sif. You lack magic and I will need the assistance. Fandral, you as well. Stop pretending to sleep to avoid responsibility.”

He could hear her but not sense her. There was a void where she should have been; she could do more than just hide herself, she could nullify her presence. Then he realized it was her fingers prodding at his back. Two other sets of hands rested on his back, low enough to avoid the shards. The void fingers lifted and Sigrdrifa began directing Sif and Fandral in removing the shards.

They flayed him open using sharp steel and deft hands. They worked quietly removing all of the shards that weren’t fully imbedded into his skin. When Sigrdrifa told Frigga and Thor to bring her any new blade not magicked Odin growled. It was a low rumble that filled the room and had the room resonating. Loki, who had finally relaxed after getting the first handful of shards out, began screaming again. The shards tried to vibrate to match pitch with the resonating healing room. Sigrdrifa snarled back, louder, before tracing a rune on Loki and the bed with a sticky-slick, bloody hand. The resonating stopped.

Pushing her fingers through her hair she snapped, “I put a null field around the bed. The room and you shouldn’t make the shards move any more with your tantrum. I need to find Heimdall. He knows the Bifrost best and should be able to help. You dig the pieces out of him without shifting them. And do not disturb the field’s circle.”

Loki could not hear her leave but the void he recognized as her faded. Odin’s footsteps, heavy and ominous, neared before Loki felt his calloused fingers rest very gently against his skin.

“Give me the blade and go back to your bed. Your hands tremble too much.”

Everyone sighed in relief as Fandral returned to his bed and Sif and Odin resumed removing the pieces of the Bifrost from Loki’s back. Frigga shifted from her position near Thor to Loki’s head with a chair in hand. There was a faint clatter as it settled. Her fingers began combing his hair as she told him about her newest blades and how she used them. Lulled by his mother’s voice and the soothing patterns – sigils for soothing and peace, he was sure of it, powerless but still somehow effective – he fell into oblivion.

()()()()()()()()()

"This is your fault," Frigga hissed in the quiet of the healing room once everyone fell asleep after removing every shard from Loki’s back. Thor twitched awake at the sound. Keeping his eyes shut he listened to his parents argue near Loki's bed.

"This is not the time for this," Odin rumbled, like far off thunder.

"Then when is? You know Sigrdrifa needs the Vault and yet you put Loki there and barred her access. It is your hubris that has had both of our sons in this room healing from encounters with her. Do not roll your eyes at me, Odin Allfather. I am your wife and I will tell you when you are wrong."

"You think Loki would be safer in his own rooms? He reneged on a deal with the Other. He is a wanted man."

"He is also our son and you cannot keep dismissing him! That is why we are in this situation in the first place!"

"Then what should I do, Frigga? Let the Treeborn come and go from the Vault as she pleases? Because my son or no, Loki will be secure."

"Yes." Thor wondered what his mother looked like as she faced her husband. They never argued in front of him or Loki growing up and if her expression was anything like her tone, he was glad for it. “You know better than all of us that he would be safer with her close. She is not provoked to violence needlessly, no matter how you wish to perceive her actions.”

Silence held for some time; Thor stopped counting the seconds. His father sighed.

"As you wish. The Valkyrie would ignore the command soon enough as it is."

()()()()()()()()()

Loki woke to darkness and muffled snores. Taking stock of his body as his training demanded he found himself free of pain and bandaged tightly. A rolled towel cushioned his face so it did not end up kinked at an awkward angle and was the reason why everything was dark. Moving his arms slowly, he started to push himself upright. A hand stopped him.

“That would be unwise.” Sigrdrifa commented above him. “You must heal. Slowly since the manacles they put you in slows the room’s effects as well as your own magic.”

“How long?” He had to make changes to the sigils and look into getting some herbalism texts so his mother could start on that aspect of the courtyard project.

“A few weeks at least. If you eat more and not repeat your foolishness, faster.” Her hand lifted and he felt her take Frigga’s chair near his head. Her hand hovered near his head for a moment before it withdrew. “You were lucky. Heimdall gave Odin the names of the pieces else we would still be working on your back. They are here, Thor, Sif, Frigga, sleeping off their exhaustion.”

“What of Odin and Heimdall? Did they not stay to see me wake?”

She snorted and thumped her foot against his bed. “Heimdall is back at his watch as is his duty. Odin is probably emptying the larder. He still gives too much; the Odinsleep is not something he should go into as often as he does at his age.”

He heard concern in her voice and it disturbed him. For someone who flagrantly disregarded and scolded Odin, she cared about him. “You know much about Odin.”

“I was a youngling in training when he was only a whelp. I know more things than your addled brain can conceive. If you behave yourself, I may even tell you.”

She was frustrating. She knew much and gave nothing, much like the rest of his family did. His chest ached dully, pulling him away from the puzzle she still posed. He needed to breathe. Her hands found his side. Quietly supporting him, Loki rolled over onto his side. Sif slept on one side of him, face pillowed in her arms, hair loose over her face, hiding whatever expression was on it. Craning his neck backwards he saw that Thor was on his other side, face resting on the bed, drooling a bit. It was painfully familiar, even his mother sleeping nearby to wake and react to his needs. For a moment he forgot that he was a forsaken unwanted child, an embarrassment and the shame of his family. Instead of dwelling on that he looked at Sigrdrifa. Her hair was uncharacteristically unbound and even her eyes looked faintly tired. She said nothing, simply watching him until something caught her attention.

Slowly she rose and with a gentle hand on his shoulder, she whispered, “Rest, boy. Everything will still be here when you wake.”

He fell asleep before she left the room.

()()()()()()()()()

Loki woke slowly, body aching like he foolishly agreed to join Hogun for his morning training regimen. He sensed a presence near him, sitting at the side of the bed. When his brain processed that the presence was female he assumed it was his mother and took his time waking up. He was healing. He could feel his body leeching whatever energy reserves he had been building up since his imprisonment. Hunger gnawed through his torso and forced him to roll onto his side; he didn’t dare roll on his back just yet.

Ungluing his eyes, he blinked to lessen the glare of the overhead light. There was a reason he relied on lamps and not just for the esoteric atmosphere it created, unlike what Fandral believed. When the figure sitting by his bed – his actual bed, not the one he used in the Healing Room – solidified into a shape, alarm closed off his throat. It wasn’t his mother sitting beside him, nor Sif, which he welcomed her temper over who sat beside him watching him sleep. A book sat unopened in her lap.

Sigrdrifa wasn’t wearing any armor or weapons, which as he now knew, meant nothing. But her hair was piled loosely on top of her head and instead of the short tunic she usually donned, she wore a dress with multiple slits in the skirt similar to what his mother preferred to wear when relaxing or training. He could see the detailing on the leggings she wore underneath, intricate latticework of tree branches that could only be his mother’s handiwork.

“What.” He demanded, voice sleep-rough and tired. “Do you now wish to beat me into something else? Perhaps this time you can attempt to drown me in a healing brew. Less mess that way.”

“No. I simply,” she paused. Her face held no expression and her voice no intonation but he still recognized that pause. It was one needed to rearrange thoughts. He waited. When she spoke again it was, if possible, even more measured. “I do not like things like this. They are cowardice. I cannot accept cowardice.”

Loki laughed. It hurt – gods it hurt – but he still laughed. “Now I am a coward too? More than the disappointment I am to my family and the self-loathing I feel, I am now a coward!”

She stood abruptly, the book falling onto the mattress as her hand slashed through the air. His laughter halted.

“I did not say that. Your,” she said a word in a language he did not recognize “your actions were cowardice. You are not a coward. A fool, true, but not a coward.”

“Is there a difference?” he asked, too tired for derision.

“Fools continue on a path despite knowing it is forfeit. You do this over and over and that is foolish, much like the fights you begin but cannot finish. You are Odin’s son no matter how much Frigga trained you. I am not surprised. But a coward, Loki, you are most certainly not. You still chose to fight those fights and that is integrity.”

“Then why are you here,” Loki demanded. He wanted to end this conversation. He wanted her to take her words, the ones that cut deeper than Bifrost shards, and leave him to collapse into his own pain. He hated how he felt when she said his name. “Why are you looking at me? It is stranger than waking to Thor’s face in the morn.”

He shifted away from her. If she wouldn’t leave he would have to stay upright and the wall was his only chance to do so. While he resembled Swiss cheese less and less as his body healed, his back was still perforated and the muscles responded sluggishly. Hoping she would interpret his expression for pain, he grit his teeth after realizing he had picked up colloquialisms after taking over Barton’s mind. It bothered him that some part of that man stayed inside him rather than the other way around. That was not how mind domination was supposed to work.

Sigrdrifa stared at him, not answering. Nodding towards him in a way that he knew meant that she was examining him but he could not definitively describe her actions. He still didn’t know what she was or how to read her. Valkyrie, yes. She more than the Other was _Other_ , beyond his ken, beyond anyone’s ken. He heard the stories growing up. Fiery women, great wings, war, but the stories never told of their depth, of their still swirling rage and perhaps even loneliness that circulated through her even now. He was the one who heard her screams, her cries in the dark, in the depths of Asgard that no one ventured into. Except for him.

“I wanted to ensure that you were healing.”

“Healing? From what – your tender ministrations?”

“Of course not. I know your mind is plagued with thoughts.”

He sneered. “Do you know what is in my mind? Have you an inkling of what could plague my thoughts? Please, do inform me.”

There was no pause in her answer this time.

“Overwhelming insecurity, your fear that you will become a true monster and yet there is a perverse part of you that wishes to become a monster. Not just embracing who you are but what your genetics claim for you to be. You are torn, like a child indecisive of what sweet he wants.” She paused for a moment, realizing something in her words. “You are a child, and I am remiss. I forget how slow even Asgardians and Jotuns develop.”

Loki was furious. “How _dare_ you!”

She was not listening. She passed through the grille as if she had no more mass than mist and walked out of the Vault. In a fit of childish rage, Loki threw a pillow at the grille before realizing that he lacked the energy to retrieve it. It was his best pillow, too.

()()()()()()()()()

Things changed with Sigrdrifa’s attack on Loki. No one spoke about Loki’s self-harm incident, oddly enough. He almost expected with being caught in the act there would be more supervision to make sure he didn’t harm himself. But no one mentioned it, meaning both Thor and Sigrdrifa kept the cause of her attack secret. One thing that had changed was Frigga was more forceful in subjecting her second child to physical affection. She touched him constantly, a hand on his shoulder as she leaned over his work, brushing his hair when she clearly woke him after a late night. He doubted she knew Sigrdrifa’s exact reasons but the thing she called a mother’s intuition probably gave her some insight. Another was that Odin visited Loki now. Odin seemed to come visit when Sigrdrifa was in the Vault meditating. The visits were typically short and awkward; Odin spent most of Loki’s childhood grooming Thor for leadership and the crown. Loki didn’t mind the visits, especially when Odin began bringing small curiosities to Loki for insight. The first were a few tiny shards of the Bifrost in a vial.

“Their resonances match yours now. They cannot be rejoined to the Bifrost.” Odin claimed gruffly.

Loki couldn’t tell if Odin’s words were truth but that vial began a small collection of things he kept in a padded case, another gift from Odin to protect all the things he’d been given. Odin rarely told him what they were, leaving Loki to research the curiosities. When Loki correctly identified each item and named its uses, Odin clapped an approving hand on his shoulder. The gesture was gentler than what Thor received but Loki could still feel the pride in Odin’s hand. It left him feeling awkward and squirming in his seat after Odin left. Sigrdrifa never commented on Loki or Odin, leaving them to talk stiltedly. She was, for a long time, just like the many artifacts in the Vault, still and quiet.

Then one day, when he was idly tossing a fist-sized crystal that clearly held something inside it but he couldn’t figure out what, she spoke.

“I have not seen an Atrejan logger in some time.”

He had forgotten she was in the Vault and bobbled the crystal when her voice came out of the shadowed alcove she often sat in. “What is an Atrejan logger?”

She stepped forward and reached through the grille, hand open. Loki placed the crystal in her hand. She inspected it and then returned it.

“An Atrejan logger was the primary device for recording information. The crystals can store data densities much greater than their size. This logger holds verbal data,” she trailed off, her eyes on the logger with something that looked like lust.

“Is there a way to activate it?” His question had her shaking the look out of her eyes.

“Tracing the bezels of the crystal in a specific pattern wakes the logger. Other gestures help specify what data you wished played. Placing a digit against the divot will trigger playback. Atreja is a fallen fruit; the exact information to activate the logger has been lost since Odin’s wanderings. I cannot help you further.” She bowed her head and left the Vault. If Loki thought she was running from him or the logger, he never voiced it.


	4. Chapter 4

With the courtyard being paved, Loki soon found him without much to do. The all-encompassing project that had kept him occupied was in a stage beyond his control. Now he had free time and every moment and thought led him back to the logger. Each time he examined it he remembered the look in Sigrdrifa’s eyes as she examined it. Sif caught him examining it when she brought him a stack of books and blank notebooks as a favor to Frigga. His mother had to be very busy to send Sif.

“It will not bite you,” she said as she let the stack drop on his desk.

He scowled at her. Since he healed, she spoke to him occasionally when she was in the Vault but he couldn’t quite say that they were talking. There was a distance she did not breach and he refused to without her permission. After all, he did try to kill her, sending the Destroyer after everyone allied with Thor. What was worse, the tightness in the corners of her mouth and eyes told him that his brother wasn’t the only one who felt the pain of him fleeing into the universe after his failed coup. He never wanted to hurt her; the pain she held from his actions hurt just as badly as Sigrdrifa’s words. They had been friends, once.

“I do not think it will.”

“Then why are you so hesitant with it? You never shrank from a puzzle.”

Loki scowled deeper. Despite her anger and their distance Sif thought she was free to throw barbs at him again. He almost wished she was still ignoring him. He offered it to her. She examined it, tossing it from hand to hand as the lamplight caught in the bezels and facets. Sif was always careful with his things unlike Thor. Even her most casual movements were well-thought out. It was how she survived the lone female warrior in Asgard’s royal court. It also was why he liked her first of all of Thor’s friends.

Sif held it to her eye, looking through it to Loki. Hundreds of that eye flicked and blinked at him. “How do you get it to work?”

“I don’t know.”

“You should ask Sigrdrifa. She knows things without even entering the library.”

Loki couldn’t help but smile wryly. The supposed source for answers was also his source of questions. “She wasn’t much help. The knowledge has been lost for some time even for her.”

Sif shrugged; it wasn’t her problem. It wasn’t really his either but he wanted to see Sigrdrifa’s eyes alight in something other than rage and battle. He growled and stood. Sif watched him pace the width of his cell a few times before calling his name. When he turned toward her – she never had to say his name twice, he would always hear her – he snatched the logger from midair and stared at it. It shined in the lamplight, winking at him in a way that made him wonder if Sif taught it to do so. He suddenly remembered hot summer nights, the sensation of bare skin damp against his own, and duets of laughter drowned by waves. Those times were long gone to time and his actions but the memories were still surprisingly fresh.

“I know what you should do.” She now leaned against his desk, another reminder of a time lost to his actions.

“Then tell me Sif.” He returned to the present and with it came a loss of patience. She was playing with him now, just like she did with the stable’s cats. Like she did when they sparred.

“Lock yourself in with a few barrels of Volstagg’s mead. It worked for you before.” A smile curled her mouth as realization dawned on his face. She bent forward to rise. “I’ll go get you a few.”

Her smile faded as Loki leaned in and kissed her cheek before sitting down at his desk. Methodically he pulled out the journals she gave him now months back and a series of pens. He waited until she was almost at the Vault’s doors before looking up from his notebook.

“Sif.” He watched her stutter to a halt. “Thank you.”

She did not look back as she continued to walk. “Don’t.”

()()()()()()()()()

The difficulty – the challenge, the fun – of the logger was there was no known variable in the equation. No start point. No set number of bezels needed to activate the logger. No known anything and when he tried to do the math on potentials it spiraled into him becoming so frustrated a journal ended up against a wall. In the end he simply began on one side of the logger and ran his finger down each bezel to see if there was a response, noting the results in his journals. Finally silvery fire ignited a bezel he stroked. It was a start. From there he just had to eliminate the incorrect pathways and hypothesize a process to activating this logger and potentially other loggers.

Loki lost track of the passage of time. Meals were mere diversions where he reviewed his notes and snarled at Thor any time he tried to say something. His mother left him pots of tea, sharply herbed for mental clarity, stamina, and soothing tight muscles that always gathered along his spine when he worked. It was a welcome deviation from the delicate sweetness of the mead. Odin did not come by and Loki was grateful. Sigrdrifa didn’t make her presence known which disappointed him. He wanted to experience her reaction to his progress.

In the course of his experimentation he learned that this logger had multiple paths, some which ended without accessing the logger. The complexity of the pattern had Loki hypothesizing that complexity could be either completely or inversely proportional to the importance of the data it held. Of course, he could only examine the hypothesis if he had more loggers, a thought he jotted into a separate journal for him to chase later.

He was close. He could feel it and that was what kept him from sleeping.

Discovering the pattern was almost accidental, like most great discoveries. Sleep deprived and fuzzy-brained Loki tried one more bezel. The silvery lines that made his eyes smart suddenly dimmed, drawing inward and creating a fire that illuminated the entire logger. Above the logger one file hovered, waiting to be activated. He pressed his finger into the divot.

A voice rose out of the logger, clear and beautiful. The voice sang a song in a language long gone and beyond even Loki’s vast linguistic skills to parse. He didn’t need to know what the voice was singing though. He knew already. It was a lullaby. He easily remembered his mother singing lullabies over him and Thor when they were younger. This lullaby was different from the ones Frigga sang. Yes, there was love but the voice singing lacked the assurance that it would see the recipient wake. In a sense the voice was clearly hoping for the sleeper to wake but it knew the waking would not happen in this lifetime. In its place was sadness, despondence, and stubborn illogical hope. It was a lullaby and a dirge for the one sleeping and the singer. Loki didn’t realize tears were streaming down his face until he heard Sigrdrifa speak.

“The Last Lullaby. I did not know it had been recorded.”

“You know this song?” Loki asked, dashing the tears from his face and pressing the heels of his palms to his burning eyes. Gods, he was exhausted but he had to see Sigrdrifa’s face. He turned and she did not disappoint. She stood on the other side of the grille, hands resting gently on it. Her eyes were alight like stars igniting amidst nebulae and he could feel the yearning without looking at the rest of her face. He beckoned her closer and without hesitation she passed through the grille and knelt beside him. Her finger gently touched the playback button to start the song from the beginning. They sat there for a time, he in his chair and her kneeling so close listening to the Lullaby. No one moved except to set the song playing again.

“Atreja was the name of the planet that orbited around Atreja Prime, its star. It’s people lacked intersystem travel but there were colonies and space stations on many of the planets beyond Atreja Prime’s habitable zone. At the end of Atreja Prime’s lifespan, it expanded engulfing Atreja. In anticipation for the inevitable, the Atrejans moved outward. Lives were lost, but not hope, not yet. In its dying throes, Atreja Prime continued to expand, wiping out each colony and station in its wake. The Last Lullaby was sang by Jeutra Shel, the last recorded pregnant individual in Atrejan space. The logger states the Lullaby occurred zero-point-two-seven traditional Atrejan solar hours before the Final Outpost was destroyed.”

“Were you there?”

“No. My duties do not include assuaging the despair of dying races. My sisters told me about it and how Shel chose to forgo becoming a Valkyrie to follow their child to rebirth.”

“Then how do you know about the Lullaby? How did the loggers survive? How?”

She smiled up at him before standing and offering her hand. When he took it, she led him to his bed and made him sit against the obscene amount of pillows his mother had added sometime while he worked. Sigrdrifa dragged his reading chair to the bed and sat in it. She waited until he was comfortable to speak.

“My sisters know my love of stories and song. They were the ones who told me of the Lullaby that summoned them and Eir to Shel’s side. Since their natures do not lend themselves to my preferences, they did not think to remember the song itself. Luckily for other fruits and I, the Atrejans released their loggers into Yggdrasil like pollen. Some of their story is lost, but not all. Thank you, Loki Coldborne.”

“It’s Laufeyson.” He didn’t think when he clarified his surname. The lack of thought flowed into the question that he had kept behind all the questions that she offered him with just a small amount of information. “What were you, before you were a Valkyrie?”

She looked surprised as she scrutinized him. “You want to know how I died?”

“No,” he answered patiently. She often asked a question to his, usually saying something far from his own meaning. “I want to know who you were before you died.”

“For a Valkyrie, those are one and the same, boy.” She summoned a goblet into her hand and poured mead into it. She offered it to him. “For this story, a drink is needed. That is, if you can keep your eyes open.”

Hearing the blatant challenge, he took the goblet and drank deep. The mead in the cup was so sweet and heavy, almost preparing him for the burden of story she was about to put on him. He recognized the old tradition for the oldest and most sacred stories. His mother made him drink like this when she told stories. He used to brush her hair as she told him, another ritual but wholly private between mother and son. He supposed this story would be worthy of the tradition as well; Sigrdrifa was a child of Yggdrasil, her immortal life a thread in the fabric of the universe. When he returned it, she drained it and tossed it over her shoulder, the goblet vanishing the moment it left her hand. As it vanished she revealed her story.

“My people were considered the dominant race in the Realm I am from, strong, beautiful, givers of knowledge and wisdom. We did not engage in war, pacifists at heart, only learning the martial arts at the core of our culture as means to express ourselves and learn discipline.

“Eventually, the races that came to us centuries ago for protection and technology grew jealous and declared war on us.”

“But your people weren’t subjugating them,” Loki protested immediately before pulling back and cursing his wagging, punch-drunk tongue.

She shrugged, the motion isolated to one shoulder as if it was not worth the entire gesture. “In truth we were more strict on ourselves, especially when interacting with the other races. We lived in perpetual fear that we would cross an indelible line. We knew not what that line was but we feared it. Perhaps our fear and discipline was what doomed us. They declared war and my people died. At first we accepted it as our lot. We hoped that after enough of us died, the other races would see their foolishness and end the war. I grew up in a conservatory for the verbal arts. Before gaining my mastery I would have had to know and recite the entire verbal history of my people. I can still remember there was always at least one voice in the Reciting Chambers going through the Task. It was the lullaby every child living there fell asleep to. But I was a child and my family was slaughtered. I was...despoiled and sent back covered in my family’s blood as a message to the Congress.

“That was their only mistake in the entire war. In my rage and grief, I roused my people to war. As the first survivor of the systematic genocide of my people, I knew firsthand the horror of the others. I used the voice I was gifted with to share the dead’s pain and I lead my people to war. We were glorious.” Her eyes were bright orange, flaring brighter with the memory.

“When the generals learned my identity, they feared. Many of them had played with me when they were young, greedy officers and now I killed their subordinates with ruthless efficiency. While we had millennia honing our martial craft, they had sheer numbers. Eventually I was captured. They defiled my body and when I no longer had a physical voice, they skinned me and flayed my muscles open before leaving me in the battle plains to be gnawed on by carrion eaters.” Her face twisted with the memory. “They prefer the marrow in bones. More nutrients there.

“As I counted my breaths down to my last two, Eir came to me and offered me a chance to raise my voice once again and never have anyone muffle it as long as the universe stood. With my second-to-last breath I said yes. I will not tell you the ritual I undertook to become a Valkyrie. Compared to it, my martyrdom was a lover’s caress.”

He would not admit it, but he didn’t want to know about the ritual. He felt invasive enough as it was, asking her about her previous life. Sick horror roiled in his gut listening to her story as a voice in his heart said, _That is true battle. That is glorious purpose. How small-minded were you in your tantrums. How childish in your ambitions_. But she offered him the goblet, he could ask more. Learn more.

“Did your people win?”

Her head shook, braid sliding across her open back. She hadn’t unbraided her hair and there was easily a meter or more between them. Her longing for the logger’s data had her cross over and touch him but she needed separation now. The comfort she needed, probably desperately, after telling her story could not be given by mortals. “Without me, my people’s muse inspiring them to war, they lost hope and died. Without my race, the Realm quickly became bloated and rotten. I went with Skogul and Svipul to witness them cutting the Realm’s stem.”

“I-I’m sorry,” he stared away, eyes wide and drying too slowly.

“It was wyrd.”

Her detachedness horrified him and had him looking at her again. “You can’t believe that it was always your people’s fate to be slaughtered.”

“You misunderstand.” She cocked her head as if looking out a window at her side. “Now is not the time to discuss wyrd. We will talk on this later.”

“But—”

“If you do not sleep soon you will start to hallucinate. Sleep, Loki. You solved this puzzle and Odin has so many more to give you.”

He didn’t care about the puzzles that Odin offered. Not now when Sigrdrifa held so much more potential and knowledge. Odin’s toys were just that. “I want to know more.”

She laughed, a careless, breathy thing and her hands were on his shoulders pressing him into his sheets. Sleep clawed at him and he struggled to focus on her nebulae eyes, once again blue.

“And I will tell you more. Later. Sleep, Loki, and dream of life.”

A hand pressed against his cheek, her thumb knowing the ball of his cheekbone. That had more questions welling up in him. He opened his mouth to ask another question but she leaned in and with a voice heavy with power she spoke once more.

“Sleep, princeling.”

Loki, somehow comforted, slid into sleep.

()()()()()()()()()

When Loki finally woke, he found Frigga tidying, stacking journals in chronological order separate from parallel journals that held his hypothesis on accessing Atrejan loggers. Sif sat amongst a pile of loose sheaves, eyeing each paper from nose-length before setting it into a stack. The logger itself sat upon the last journal Loki had been working in on the side of his bed. Inside the journal was a script not his own with the information Sigrdrifa told him about Atreja as well as the lyrics to the Last Lullaby in what he could assume was Atrejan and then in Asgardian. After he read the words three times he let his head fall back on the pillows.

No wonder Sigrdrifa had lust in her eyes when she saw the logger. The Last Lullaby was more than just the last recorded piece of Atrejan history. It was a prayer to whomever the Atrejan’s saw as God that Shel would see their unborn child wake. This kind of data would be the next big archaeological find in any system, on any fruit that managed to discover the secret of the logger. Not even this logger but the loggers found by other cultures. The thought of mapping potential trajectories of launched loggers had him out of bed and halfway to his desk before Sif called his name.

“Do not move Loki. I swear by the Eldest gods if you mess my piles I will gut you.”

Her tone, not her words had his body frozen.

“Do tell me when I can move, my dear Sif. I hang on every word.”

Sif snarled at him. It sounded like steel leaving its sheath.

“Stop, the both of you. Are you children or adults?” Frigga scolded. She eyed Loki. “You should not be out of bed.”

“But—”

“Get. Back. Into. Bed.” Frigga’s eyes did not hold unfathomable fondness for Loki, but the knowledge and experience of a mother with a troublesome child.

Loki slipped back into bed. He ate the food Frigga put in front of him without complaint or question. He slept – at least napped or dozed – when she told him. He was not foolish enough to challenge his mother. The thought had him wondering if Sigrdrifa was watching. Perhaps it would alter her view of him even a little bit.

Eventually Frigga shook him awake and his room – cell – was back to his preferred pristine condition. Sif was nowhere to be seen but there were tidy stacks of papers tied with twine near his desk.

“Mother?” he asked, blearily. Sleep still clung to him but he could see him calling her that startled her. She quickly recovered and smoothed his sleep-tousled hair down.

“Your father wants to speak with you.”

Loki looked in the direction she nodded and saw Odin standing firm outside the grille. With a touch of Odin’s hand, the grille vanished like mist in the sun. Frigga leaned in long enough to kiss Loki’s brow, then Odin’s cheek before making her way out of the Vault.

Alone with Odin, he asked, “Is this a test?”

Odin looked beleaguered. Like Loki was a young man again and coming into his magic. Like if he had to hear the complaint of another noble felled by one of Loki’s pranks he would go into the Odinsleep just to get some peace. Like when he, Thor, Sif, and the Warriors Three had shaken another tavern to its foundation carousing. “No, Loki. It’s trust. Try not to anger the Valkyrie. She has a deadly left uppercut.”

From the darkness of the Vault’s alcoves, Sigrdrifa cackled madly. Turning, he left, a regal presence that Loki could never forget. Loki turned in her direction, not awake nor brave enough to approach her.

“You like to needle Odin.”

She snorted and rose closer than he originally thought.  She had been tucked behind the Eye. It still slumbered, rather than watching Sigrdrifa stretch. “Of course I do. After all, I’ve known Odin Allfather since he was a whelp.” Her wings snapped out and closed behind her as she rolled her shoulders one last time. Loki’s mouth snapped shut. “Behave, Loki Coldborne, and maybe I’ll tell you.”


	5. Chapter 5

    With his prison unexpectedly expanded, so did Loki’s life. More to the point, his life got significantly _louder_. The next day after Odin gave Loki free reign the Warriors Three invaded with parcels that turned out to be furniture from his suite. Without any regard they began shifting furniture about, arguing whether there should be a settee in front of whichever artifact that caught their eye.

“This place is dreadfully creepy,” Fandral commented as he lounged on a chaise longue that blocked most of the entry to Loki’s room. “Does the Eye watch you all the time?”

“I hadn’t noticed,” Loki bit out through clenched teeth as he once again pointed at where his bed belonged and not where Volstagg thought it should be. Grumbling, Volstagg finally returned it to its place.

“The Cask of Ancient Winters is here. I thought it lost.” Hogun was the only one who wasn’t making things more difficult for Loki. He only brought more bookcases and a few more floor pillows for meditation or reading since Loki only had his bed and reading chair. Hogun was always the sensible one of Thor’s cadre. It wasn’t much of an endorsement, but it was all Loki was ever amiable to give. Right now, with a migraine starting to form from his brother’s friends’ unsupervised assistance, it was more of a memory of an endorsement than an actual one.

“It fell, like Loki. Unlike Loki, I caught it and returned it to Odin when I landed on Asgard since its time hasn’t come to return to Jotunheim.”

Every male in the Vault froze and turned enough to watch Sigrdrifa come down the steps, Sif in tow. When Sigrdrifa added nothing more, Hogun stepped out of the Cask’s alcove to bow in her direction. She nodded in reply before vanishing into one of the empty alcoves. Sif continued forward until she met with Fandral’s chaise longue barrier. She shoved it easily out of her way before letting her thumbs tuck into her weapon belt. Her fingers curled enough that a blade would fit in them without a thought.

“Thor is in the sparring ring alone. Join him.”

When the Vault became blessedly quiet, Sif shifted her focus onto him. “Odin felt you needed better appointments. Since the Allfather still believes that you need to be sheltered here, it was thought that your rooms should be brought to you instead of vice versa.”

He wondered how much of her words were Sigrdrifa’s and how much were her own. The casual comfort between the two women was apparent the moment he saw them together. “And the Warriors Three took initiative for once.”

Sif nodded. “Lady Frigga had plans for what was to be brought to you but she is still occupied with the courtyard construction.”

“Oh? Where is she in the repairs?”

“The mosaic tiles are finally carved. Now the workers can lay them.”

“Mother hand carved them herself?”

“Hm. She said they would be more effective and there would be less chance for a mistake. She said you worked too hard to not have everything in its right place.”

“That sounds like my mother.”

“Hm,” Sif answered absently, eyes surveying Loki’s room. “Wheredoyou want this chaise?”

“Perpendicular to the new bookshelves, if you could. I would like to make some delineation between my area and the rest of the Vault.” Expanding his living space into the Vault seemed too blasé.

He watched her lift and move the chaise longue to where he indicated. Once it was in position she went for one of his armchairs stacked haphazardly near the Vault’s doors and placed it so the combination of bookshelves and furniture recreated a much smaller version of his private library. Sitting cushions were tucked into the corners to be easily pulled out and used. Instead of windows behind the chaise, the Vault sprawled outward, a sight of treasures and dark walls. Here he doubted he would have to wake Sif from dozing in afternoon sunbeams with a brushing kiss as he saved her placement in the book she had been reading. He highly doubted they would arrive late to dinner from opposite directions just mussed enough to catch his mother’s eye. Frigga refused to explain why she smiled in that knowing way to anyone.

As she settled a second ottoman in place near a collection of pillows Loki said, “I think my mother is trying to get us to talk. Sif, I did no—”

“No.” Sif stood quickly but would not turn to look at him. “I don’t want to talk, Loki. I don’t want to talk to you or about you. Just tell me where you want your furniture and what else you want from your rooms.”

()()()()()()()()()

The next morning Loki woke in a sour mood. It held against Thor’s regular morning cheerfulness, he sullenly eating as Thor described in detail sparring against the Warriors Three.

“They had nothing on me, brother. No matter what they tried – they threw Fandral at me, literally! – they couldn’t make headway against me. It took Sif’s arrival to put the sparring on equal ground. She fought like a woman scorned. By the end of it us four were fighting against her and losing. If Mother hadn’t interrupted the sparring I am sure she would have left us needing the healing room again. Loki?”

“What,” he bit out, feeling his temper hone sharp enough to cut air. A few of the relics resonated in reply, a sensation he only felt when Sigrdrifa was meditating nearby.

“You’re ruining the tableware.”

Looking down, Loki found the glass in one hand splintering into a spider web of cracks. In his other hand, his spoon followed the contours of his clenched fist. He put both down slowly, infinitesimally careful. With the same amount of care he rose and shut the bathroom door behind him.

Thor’s voice filtered through saying, “I’ll just leave you some fruit if you wish to eat later on.”

Stripping down, Loki put the shower heat as high as possible and stepped under the spray. He wanted to scream. He wanted to bleed until there was nothing left of him. His brother was too near for the former. Thor would easily beat down the walls to get to him. The latter he could not consider without remembering what Sigrdrifa did when she caught him harming himself that time. She would know if he bled again, her attention was turned on him now, he knew. Someone with her abilities could easily surveil him while going about whatever duties she had being in Asgard. Sinking to the floor, he let the hot water beat against him until he felt like the Hulk had taken him to task. It wasn’t enough to fully exorcise him of his emotions but it was enough for him to be civil to whomever he had to deal with invading his room. Now it was a daily occurrence, sometimes even multiple times a day.

The universe must have decided to give him some sort of respite. His first visitor since Thor was Sigrdrifa. She took one look at him and snorted.

“You sure know how to get yourself into trouble. Though it is rare to see someone so eager to dive headfirst into the quagmires you get yourself into. It must be one of your many gifts.”

Her words easily pierced the facsimile of calm that formed over his temper and without thinking, he demanded, “Why? Why do you speak to me in this way? Why do you _care_?”

“Because I know you.” Hung in the air like an impenetrable wall keeping him from retorting as she found her alcove and settled down to meditate.

Her dismissal had him reeling, suddenly without ground to stand his temper on. He surreptitiously watched her meditate for hours hoping for some small word that would begin the rebuilding process of his reality, but she was as still as the Vault. Her presence was a cornerstone of silence and peace; even the most volatile artifacts calmed when she found her seat in her alcove. Now nothing resonated with him nor her, it all slumbered in Sigrdrifa’s even breath.

“Tell me.” He said into the silence of the Vault when he finally found his courage and his voice. She did not respond but he felt like she was listening. It was the minutiae of her stance that told him of her attention. It was like reading his mother but wholly more difficult, like trying to calculate the movement of astral bodies billions of light years away with only his eyes. He tried again, fists and eyes squeezing shut from the effort. “Please. Tell me how you know me.”

He kept his eyes shut, not prepared for the impact of her rejection. He would reject his request. It was petty and presumptuous, the demands of a spoiled child. Then her presence appeared by his side. She took his hand, gently, and led him to his corner of pillows. He hadn’t felt comfortable enough to lounge in them after Sif arranged them exactly in the way he preferred but he sat all the same. She knelt next to him and offered her braid. He began unbraiding her hair without questioning her. It was a mental puzzle that challenged him just as much as the Atrejan logger. There were so many different braids within the larger; it took him longer than he expected to unwind the entirety. When its full length tumbled over one shoulder she plucked a brush from the air and began brushing her hair.

“No one can remember every moment of their life. We met when you were a babe. It was when Valkyries were more active in Asgard’s history. It is customary for a Valkyrie to visit children of Odin Allfather. It is an honor he received because of our relationship with him. You do know that when he was a whelp he trained under my older sisters. Close your mouth, boy.”

Loki’s teeth did not click as he snapped his mouth shut but it was a near thing. “What was he like as a child?”

“We referred to him as ‘the whelp’ and for good reason. On his first lesson he scoffed that a woman could not teach him anything he already knew. Randgris dumped him head over ass into the Falling Sea.”

His brain stuttered to a stop. “Randgris threw Odin Allfather into the Falling Sea. Was she mad?”

“Not in the way you’re asking. She was furious with Mother and the Allfather and he was an easy target. Still is, if I am truthful. Luckily for Odin, she is more forgiving than some of my other sisters. She pulled him out of the Falling Sea long before it fell into Oblivion.”

“And you?”

She smiled, eyes wrinkling in amused memory. “I was a youngling at the time. My body was fully formed but I was still in training to master myself and the abilities growing inside of me.” She laughed quietly, to herself. “The years that the Allfather spent with us are known as the growing pain years between my elder Sisters. Often enough he and I would be pitted against each other to give our instructors a rest. He still holds a grudge that I let him win once. In my defense, I had just returned from standing witness for my first Cutting. I was not myself.”

“I could believe that,” Loki muttered, not trying to be quiet enough for her to not hear and she laughed again, more open and mocking.

“It’s Odin’s pride that pricks him more than Hrund ever tried. That pride he passed onto his sons.” She looked at him knowingly.

“I am not his son.”

“Oh?” She pointed her brush at him and Loki suddenly felt that he was under the point of her blade again. “Then centuries of love and care mean naught? Even you are not that naïve, Loki.”

“I am Laufeyson. Even now that is the name that is breathed when people mention me.”

“And yet matrons and crones still pray for Odin and Frigga’s lost little boy. Memories of Odin’s dark son still keep youths of all sorts warm at night. No matter what you think in that convoluted head of yours, Loki, you were yearned for,” Sigrdrifa told him in the straightforward way that meant she was going to tear another piece of his foundation away. Twice in one day was more than enough. Right now he preferred if she just let him rot in the Vault with the rest of the antiquities.

“You lie.”

“Valkyries do not lie,” she snapped.

He winced. She didn’t need a weapon to cut him; her voice was sharp enough. “I don’t believe you.”

She shrugged, dismissive. “Believe what you wish, boy, you do it enough.”

With that she fell into a meditative silence, quietly brushing her hair, lost in thoughts unknowable. The Eye looked at him, rolled itself and came to rest as well. He was alone again. His books didn’t interest him so he strolled the Vault’s length carefully avoiding the pillows Sigrdrifa sat upon. The space was technically his yet she wholly possessed it, leaving him feeling comfortable in the shadows. He caught himself before his thoughts could go down that maudlin road and settled in one of the alcoves Sigrdrifa often used. From this place he could see that she had shifted, moving pillows near the Eye’s alcove resting legs, now bare to the knee, into the water that flowed through. Her wings stretched out behind her low and lazy as if she were sitting on a bough of Yggdrasil instead of a prison. He didn’t know where her brush was but her hair spilled free behind her.

He swallowed his pride once again and knelt before her.

“Explain your words. Please.”

She rose and walked past him, pillow in hand. Following her closely, he watched her take a brush from the air again. Sitting on his bed she gestured to him to sit at her feet. He sat on the cushion she left there, begrudgingly taking her hair and unraveling the knot she had tied in it in his pacing. It was already becoming a habit and it bothered him that he was just as eager to free her hair as he was when he was a child at his mother’s feet. It reminded him of the secret lessons Frigga taught him in the privacy of her own rooms. The things Sigrdrifa told him, they were as sacred as what Frigga told him and he tucked her words away for later study.

“Your mother is strong. In body and heart, she is unparalleled, the only woman to stand beside and behind Odin Allfather as his support. She was ecstatic when she learned of her pregnancy. All of my sisters took time to sit with her and brush her hair. The ones who were once mothers gave their advice.

“We did not expect Thor’s birth to have the complications it did. Eir was called in to midwife and the First summoned me. I held Frigga’s hand as I incited her will to fight and win that battle. Eir had taken mothers who died in childbirth before but no one wanted Frigga to join our ranks. That was the only day a Valkyrie did not take honored dead; we all held our breaths.

Her brushing slowed and her hands rested in her lap remembering. Loki wondered what she saw. Did his mother scream from labor pains? He couldn’t even imagine it; Frigga never raised her voice, didn’t need to to quell whatever scuffle he and his brother got into. How did Odin take the possibility of his beloved’s death, let alone his unborn son and heir?

He reached for the brush. When Frigga became lost in the depths of a story he used to brush her hair until she returned. Sigrdrifa started and plucked it from his hands before he could reach for her hair.

“But your mother was strong. Thor was born squalling and demanding the world to pay attention to him. And we did. He was such a bright child and for a time, there was happiness. Then war with the Jotuns broke out. I was there, inciting both sides to fight with all their hearts. It was a good battle.

“You incited both sides?” Loki asked. “Wasn’t that unfair? I thought Valkyries side with—”

“We side with no one,” she interrupted. “We are daughters of Yggdrasil. No Valkyrie was tasked with ensuring a victor, just to reap the souls of the war. So I enflamed the hearts of Asgardian and Jotun alike.

“What we didn’t know, your father included, was that as we waged war Frigga craved another child. She did not want Thor to be alone growing up. She wanted another to balance her bright exuberant boy. Under Eir’s suggestion for her safety, Frigga had given up her fertility. There was no way she could have another child. Instead of bemoaning her fate like others had, she went out to the ash tree in the palace garden and cut open her hand. Blood dripping on the roots, she asked Yggdrasil for a child. The blood told my Mother of another’s yearning, the mead shared between Frigga and the tree enforced the contract offered by Frigga.

“The war was nearly over when I was told to give the souls I had reaped over to my sisters and encourage another. You were so small, so sweet bawling your existence into the cold darkness,” she told him fondly, stroking his cheek with a barely closed fist, thumb lingering over his cheekbone. It warmed him as his throat closed, barely remembered emotions taking hold. “I sat with you three days, singing you songs that you clung to with all of your being. I knew you would be great indeed.”

Just as quietly as she had touched him, her fingers dropped and she began to brush anew. Her fingers’ absence left him feeling isolated and stumbling, like the music he had been dancing to abruptly cut off. When she had told him that she knew him as a babe he didn’t realize she meant she knew him before his adoption.

“Odin found you and without provocation took you back to Asgard. Gave you a name and a future.” She looked at his face, puzzled. “Did you not think of why Frigga kept you so close? Mothers do that when it costs much to gain that child.”

She spoke so frankly, like her words were simple truths to be accepted and not weighed for potential currency to hurt or maim. For someone who apparently lived amongst nobles and courts she lacked any sort of political manipulation. Then again, she could blink and hold entire galaxies in her eyes. Her voice was a blade honed for her pleasure. She was made of the universe in Yggdrasil’s image of Her ideal child. Instead, she was a manipulator, using words to break down and build others. In one breath she did both to Loki.

Rising she shook out her hair behind her, the deep blue-black of it shining in the way that reminded him of a nebula about to ignite. She passed him, fingers brushing his forehead in a way that seemed familiar and made her way to the exit; it was nearly dinner and Thor would be down soon with his and Loki’s meal.

“Wait,” he called from where he was still sitting. Her footsteps stopped. “What songs did you sing me?”

“Jotun warsongs I learned from a sister; what better for a prince of your caliber?”

Her words echoed longer than the great doors to the Vault shutting and had him quiet when Thor arrived with dinner. What he didn’t expect was his mother to join them. Still in thought, he offered his cheek for her to kiss easily and felt a small smile pressed into his skin with the kiss.

They left him to his thoughts, which were more or less a Jotunheim blizzard of emotions and half-formed words. As such, dinner was a quiet, meandering affair where Frigga spoke at length about the gardens, her horses, the new blades she recently had commissioned, and on and on. Loki, used to conversations as such, nodded where necessary and added in a word or two for Thor’s benefit. Thor was hopelessly lost in Frigga’s commentary, face screwing up in thought as he tried to parse the esoteric language of household concerns and ‘female things’ that Thor scoffed at far out of earshot of both his mother and Sif.

As Thor cleared away the dishes, Frigga sat in Loki’s sitting area and Loki felt the rocking blow of how different his mother and Sigrdrifa were. He sat easily next to her on the chaise longue and she wrapped him in her arms, guiding his head to her shoulder. They sat in silence, companionable creatures of magic and craft.

“Sigrdrifa has been spending a lot of time with you. Has she spoken?”

Loki laughed from where his neck was beginning to form a crick. His mother was so tall. Yet compared to his height, she was so small. It was a puzzle his mind accepted as truth and left in the vault of his mind. “Much and thoroughly. Though I fear I am too dense to learn her lessons.”

“Hush. You will learn the lessons she wants to teach. You are the smartest child I know. I raised you after all.”

“You still take pride in raising me, a traitor?”

Frigga lifted his head with both hands, trapping him so she could look into her eyes. “You are still my son. How can I not be proud of every part of you?”

Loki’s voice caught in his throat. “B-but I—“

“But nothing. No matter what you claim, I still claim you. You are my son, a prince, and the honored one, to gain the regard of a Valkyrie.” Frigga’s vehemence had Loki choking on laughter, straightening. His neck cracked and it made her smile in return.

“‘Regard', is it. It doesn’t feel like regard.”

Frigga laughed in answer. “Each Valkyrie has their own gift. It drives their entire existence. Sigrdrifa’s is unique among her Sisters.”

“Is hers the ability to create insufferable riddles that plague the mind?” Loki groused, suddenly feeling like his tutors once again refused to give him advanced materials. It made Frigga laugh harder. Her hand shook with amusement as she patted his cheek. It felt very different from Sigrdrifa’s gesture.

“No, it is not. I’m sure you’ll learn it in time.” She looked up. “It’s late, you should get some sleep.”

“Yes, mother.”

Escorting her to the Vault doors, he let her embrace him. He didn’t embrace her in return and she didn’t say anything. There was understanding between them at least on this. It reassured Loki enough to catch her attention one last time.

“Mother? Sending Sif to the Vault is going to end with your other son in the Healing Room and another courtyard in ruins. Unless that is your plan.”

“It is not. I just want whatever is between you two done.”

“It’s not that simple.”

“Of everything at hand, it is. Do you think I enjoy my household sundered as it is?”

Loki bowed, giving into his mother’s logic but still not able to stay anything. Kissing her hand, he let her leave, the Vault suddenly empty. He opened his mouth, closed it, then let it fall open to form words.

Whatever he said, there was no response.


End file.
